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Facing takedown demands: Free Speech Week
A recent article by the Poynter Institute’s Rick Edmonds brings to light free speech choices journalists sometimes have to make.
At issue are Takedown Demands. Scholastic media are not – and will not be – exempt from challenges raised by them.
Free Speech Week is a good time to check out the topic and formalize your student media’s approach to preventing issues such demands can create.
Instead of one way to react to Takedown Demands, we offer choices to help students make informed choices. In all situations, we recommend the SPLC’s existing work on the subject. We also hope these guidelines will offer a roadmap if your students face takedown decisions.
In addition, we also offer series of guideposts to evaluate information before it is posted: A Put Up policy that might prevent hard choices later.
Our guidelines look at legal demands, ethical considerations and possible reactions
Read MoreIn plain view from public places: Photojournalists and free speech
What can and cannot be photographed continues to fall under question, bringing attention to photojournalists and igniting important First Amendment conversations. As part of other Free Speech Week lessons and activities, teachers may use this opportunity to incorporate key readings and discussion geared toward visual storytellers.
For starters, journalism students paying attention to current events likely caught last week’s story of documentarian Deia Schlosberg arrested while filming an oil pipeline protest in North Dakota. If needed, teachers can engage students in a quick research activity to update each other. Key questions: What’s the story? How does this relate to the First Amendment? How does a photojournalist’s role compare to that of a documentarian?
Photojournalists use the phrase “in plain view from public spaces” to describe in broad terms their interpretation of access and privacy as related to their First Amendment rights. What does this mean? Teachers can consider this as a warm-up writing prompt or partner conversation between students before sharing as a larger group.
To read more about photojournalists and the First Amendment, teachers can assign small groups to read and report on any of these articles:
NYT Lens blog: Criminalizing photography
University of Missouri protest “muscle” incident
Pennsylvania student shooting routine traffic stop
First Amendment Center: Photographs as speech
ACLU: What to do if you’re detained
Police, cameras and the Constitution
To tie in a media literacy component, teachers may add “Photography and the Law: Know Your Rights” from Photojojo. How is this article more or less credible? How does the material compare to the other articles under discussion? What factor(s) affected your analysis?
It’s likely that most journalism classes already discussed this photo from Aleppo and a related article back in August, but the connection here is strong between the power of a photo and why the world depends on photojournalists to capture what audiences need to see, regardless of how terrifying, depressing or controversial those images may be.
The National Press Photographers Association offers this statement about its advocacy work protecting photojournalists’ rights.
After reading related articles and discussing efforts underway to protect those constitutional freedoms, teachers may want to present powerful storytelling images that may spark debate about free speech and/or the ethical considerations photojournalists face. One option is to assign students to find and share photos on their own.
Here is a simple list of possible photos and/or photographers to research and discuss:
- Yannis Behrakis, winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news photography, on the refugee crisis in Greece
- “General Nguyen Ngoc Loan Executing a Viet Cong Prisoner in Saigon” by Eddie Adams in 1968
- Pulitzer Prize-winning photos taken by photojournalist Paul Watson of a dead American soldier being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu
- Image galleries showing treatment of Iraq prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison complex
- “The vulture and the little girl” by South African photojournalist Kevin Carter in 1993
- “The Falling Man” by Richard Drew during 9/11 attacks
- “Fire on Marlborough Street” or “Fire escape collapse” by Stanley Forman
- “The Burning Monk” by Malcolm Browne
From celebrating Free Speech Week and First Amendment protection of what photojournalists can do legally to the ongoing considerations of what they should do ethically, the topic is one worth exploring on a regular basis.
by Sarah Nichols, MJE
Read MoreJust This Once: FSW lesson 2
The American Library Association’s Intellectual Freedom Committee released “The Speaker … A Film About Freedom” in 1977. The film, in its original form, comes with a discussion guide. Today, the website for it has the discussion guide and links to coverage about the film and other pertinent articles. Controversial in 1977, the film today hits at many current issues surrounding free speech. Note the date, 1977. Clothing and style reflect that timeframe. It might take students a while to get beyond that and into the First Amendment issues.
Title
“Just this once”
Description
Based on a 1977 film by the American Library Association, The Speaker, on whether a school and its community should allow a speaker to talk on controversial issues. The key question is, essentially, “What is the harm in just this once in preventing a person from speaking an idea.”
Objectives
- Students will analyze the questions raised in the film.
- Students will discuss the issues raised in the film.
- Students will develop a position based on what they find.
- Students will formulate possible alternative solutions to the film’s outcome.
Common Core State Standards
| CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.7 | Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in different media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words in order to address a question or solve a problem. |
| CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.9-10.4 | Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative, connotative, and technical meanings; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone (e.g., how the language of a court opinion differs from that of a newspaper). |
| CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.9-10.5 | Analyze in detail how an author’s ideas or claims are developed and refined by particular sentences, paragraphs, or larger portions of a text (e.g., a section or chapter). |
Length
120 minutes
Materials / resources
Internet access for the film’s background: http://www.ala.org/news/press-releases/2014/05/ala-members-discuss-controversial-film-speaker-annual-conference
The Speaker: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojFYx52X-Ys
Lesson step-by-step
Step 1 — introduction (10 minutes)
The teacher should present background to the film from the ALA site and raise the essential question for the activity: “What is the harm in just this once in preventing a person from speaking an idea.” Stress should be placed on the concept of free expression, especially in context with Free Speech Week. The teacher might also have to discuss the difference in clothing and fashion.
Step 2 — Show the film (43 minutes)
Option 1: Show the film in its entirety without stopping for explanation. Students would have to take notes and jot down questions they have.
Option 2: Stop the film at student questions or at teacher-chosen key points for discussion/explanation. This, of course would lengthen the presentation time into Day 2.
Step 3:— Processing the film’s information (7 minutes) (Homework assignment)
Ask students to examine their notes and list key points made for and against the speaker, and to be ready to discuss the issues and to plan for alternatives.
Step 4 — Day 2 Discussion (25 minutes)
Students will discuss the issues of the film, working toward a conclusion of whether the speaker should speak.
Option 1: Small group discussion with each group reaching a decision which would have to be resolved in class.
Option 2: Large group discussion with possible resolutions posted on whiteboard for decisions.
Step 5 — Alternatives and solutions (25 minutes)
With their possible solutions of the whiteboard, have students work in small groups to examine alternatives. Is it an either-or dilemma? Are alternatives possible and would they help accommodate all positions? What types of ethical problem solving is possible? Have the small groups work toward explaining their decision in terms of ethics.
Step 6 — Final discussion (10 minutes)
What surprised you the most? What was the best alternative or solution? How as a journalist should you apply the issues involved?
Assign each student to prepare a 50 word or less statement in the form of a poster of why his or her decision of “just this once” is the ethical stance to take. Statement due the next class.
Step 7 — Assessment
Credit given to student responses in the 50-word statement. Post them in the classroom for continued discussion and possible use in class/staff ethical guidelines.
Differentiation
The teacher might have students watch the video at home and take notes there, shortening the lessons by one day.
Extension
The class could spend an additional day making the issues current by replacing the speaker with a politician/issues from the 2016 presidential election.
Read MoreFree Speech Week lesson:
What does the First Amendment protect
Lesson:
What does the First Amendment protect?
Description:
This lesson takes a look at the freedoms the First Amendment to the Constitution protects and explores what these mean to students.
Objectives:
- Students will understand more about their rights.
- Students will see how the First Amendment applies to them.
- Students will learn the First Amendment.
Common Core State Standards:
| CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.9-10.9 | Analyze seminal U.S. documents of historical and literary significance (e.g., Washington’s Farewell Address, the Gettysburg Address, Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms speech, King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”), including how they address related themes and concepts. |
| CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.8 | Delineate and evaluate the reasoning in seminal U.S. texts, including the application of constitutional principles and use of legal reasoning (e.g., in U.S. Supreme Court majority opinions and dissents) and the premises, purposes, and arguments in works of public advocacy (e.g., The Federalist, presidential addresses). |
Length 50 – 60 minutes
Materials
- Copies of the First Amendment for each student
- First Amendment: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
- White board and markers
Introduction (10 minutes)
When students enter the class, ask them to take out a sheet of paper and write down the five freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution. When they are finished, share with them the answers: region, speech, press, assembly, petition. Discuss briefly what each of these mean.
Small Groups (15 – 20 minutes)
Break into five groups (or, depending on the size of the class, 10 groups with two groups doing each freedom) and assign each group a freedom. Ask each group to list all the ways that freedom impacts their lives. (answers will vary, but should include such things as how free speech would affect students wearing political t-shirts, free press would impact students making content decisions in student media, students wanting to make a change in school policy, etc.)
Report out (10 – 15 minutes)
Have someone from each group list his or her group’s answer on the white board. As each freedom is posted, ask others in the class to add any other ways that freedom comes into play in their lives.
Exit slips (10 minutes)
Ask students to choose one of the five freedoms they think impacts them the most and write why it’s important to them.
Extension
Challenge students to memorize the First Amendment and recite it to the class in the future. Have prizes (candy, hand-made badge, etc.) to award when they successfully repeat the 45 words of this important document.
Read MoreEthics workshop offers videos, lesson plans
by Candace Perkins Bowen, MJE
When Kent State University and The Poynter Institute team up for their annual ethics workshop, they don’t forget high school journalism teachers and students who can’t come to Ohio for a day of top speakers and plenty of exploration into some aspect of media ethics.
Again this year, with Social Justice Journalism as the theme, they have provided detailed lesson plans to go along with some of the day’s events.
Keynoter — and the subject of one set of plans — was Jose Antonio Vargas, the opening speaker at the National High School Journalism convention in Los Angeles in the spring. Archived videos of his very personal and passionate talk about being an undocumented immigrant plus videos of all the other panels of the day are now available online.
A lesson plan about Vargas’s situation and one of a panel focused on the Flint water crisis — and what those could mean as student media topics — are downloadable here.
Archives for previous workshops on topics such as Enduring Trauma, That’s Entertainment, Dirty Politics and Foul Play (sports issues) are also available along with lesson plans. (Archives in the top purple bar)
Read More